Striving still

Jesus said: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear.  For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing.  Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them.  Of how much more value are you than the birds!  And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?  If then you are not able to do so small a thing as that, why do you worry about the rest?  Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.  But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you—you of little faith!  And do not keep striving for what you are to eat and what you are to drink, and do not keep worrying.  For it is the nations of the world that strive after all these things, and your Father knows that you need them.  Instead, strive for his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well."  (Luke 12:22-31)

It would be easy to reduce this to "don't worry, be happy."  Or even "don't worry, be happy, God will provide."  And then just sit back and wait for it, whatever "it" is, to be provided.

If only we were ravens or lilies, right?

That would be great, but even so, Jesus isn't using them as an example of "if you only believe, that's enough."  The point of the raven and the lilly is that they already live in relationship with the world around them, so that they are fed and clothed.  Each has a place in the web of creation, each relates to earth and sky and air such that they are fed and watered, each gives and receives in its own way, as needed.  That's the greatest beauty of creation, that it works in relationship within itself. 

At least, all of creation but us.  And that's Jesus point.  To strive for God's kingdom is to live in relationship with all things - all things - as God intended.

No, this is not one of those environmentalist rants.  But it could be.  And it should be.  Because that's an important piece of the kingdom.  How we love the earth and all its creatures should equal how we love each other and how we love God.   That means respect, care, compassion, justice and grace.

Being good stewards of the earth is about care and love, not authority.  Even if you want to "have dominion," thanks to Genesis, that's really about good governance, I think.  And good governance shouldn't be about power over things, it should be about power with things for everyone's mutual benefit.  Tell your MP that.

And yes, I drive a car, I heat the house and power my computer.  I recycle, but probably not as much as I could.  Call me a hypocrite if you want, but I'm not suggesting perfection is happening anytime soon for anyone, I'm just saying we should try to make an effort.

But that's still just a part of what Jesus is saying.  After all, "life is more than food, and the body more than clothing"  (Luke 12:23).  

Jesus calls us to be right in spirit, in heart and mind.  That might seem more of a challenge than being right with creation - it is - because it requires us to look at our relationship with ourselves.  But with that, we can then truly love our neighbour as ourselves.  With that, we shall not want (to paraphrase a psalm).  With that, all "these things will be given to you as well."

Dive in, the water's fine

Each fall in our church we've started using the Season of Creation Lectionary which gives us five Sundays with themes about our relationship with the world around us.  It was started in Australia, which explains why we are engaging creation at the harvest end of our summer - it's coming into spring down there.  But that's not a bad thing.  We're surrounded by the beauty of creation in it's abundance, rather than the expectation of it.

So this week, as we enter September and some return to school, some to work and some just to the routine of the fall season, we are diving into the Ocean.  The gospel story is Luke's account of the calling of the first disciples, fishermen that Jesus meets by the Sea of Galilee.  "'Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.'  When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him" (Luke 5:10-11).

Except they didn't leave "everything."  That's why the story is so deep in meaning (pun intended).  They were still fishermen, casting their nets out into the deep sea.  That skill they bring with them.  What they leave behind is the physical "stuff," their boats and nets.  And families, too.  It's just that now they're fishing in a sea of life, not water.

Okay, that's a huge change, but the metaphor is still beautifully simple and appropriate.  It should also call us to wonder , though, at the risk that is always present in following Jesus.  Not what we might be leaving behind, but what we might be sailing into.  Just as he did the disciples, Jesus calls us to dive deep into a sea that's unfamiliar to us.

But it's a sea that's full of great mysteries and wonders.  That's why it's such a great story to begin a period of reflection about our relationship with the world around us.  Dive in, Jesus says, the water's fine.

And it is.  And abundantly blessed by Jesus.  When he first comes to the seashore in Luke's story, the fishermen had been having a bad day.  They'd caught nothing.  Jesus, after preaching from one of the boats, tells them to "put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch" (Luke 5:4).  They do, and suddenly there are so many fish they need help to bring them in.

If we are willing to go into the deep water with Jesus, we, too, will find an abundance where we previously found little.  That's the risk - and promise - to which Jesus calls us.

What a great time of year to reflect on that.  For some, we go back to familiar things and familiar places.  Yet, we still go forward to new experiences.  For others, new places and new experiences might mean the only truly familiar thing is ourselves.  In every case, Jesus calls us to go deep, to experience the richness of life - challenge and opportunity, mystery and wonder - trusting that God goes there with us.

So take a deep breath and dive in.  Go deep.  Jesus is with you.

A head in the clouds

We've been doing some little renovations and updating of our church this summer.  Mostly volunteers from the congregation have been renovating and expanding our kitchen and painting.  It's just a few things that need doing after twenty-something years.

I was talking to somebody about that today, reminding them - and me - that when this "new" church building was built, it was built by members of the congregation themselves.  In fact there's a great album of pictures chronicling the build.  "Really?," they said, they had no idea there was an album.

Well, there's more than that album.  Thanks to some conscientious "historians," there's a few albums with pictures and old bulletins and newsletters, clippings from the papers, great mementoes of what's happened, when and who was involved.  They help tell part of the story of faith in this community.

I think that's a little of what the writer of the Letter to the Hebrews was doing in the passage we're hearing this week (Hebrews 11:29-12:2).  It's a collection of some figures and events, historical moments of faith to remind us of what it means to be faithful.  

And it's not just happy memories, of course.  Inspiration can come from moments of hardship and suffering, too.  Some "suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment.  They were stoned to death, they were sawn in two, they were killed by the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, persecuted, tormented" (Hebrews 11:36-37).

I don't suppose any of our albums have pictures like that, thank goodness.

But it reminds me to pause for a moment and consider what examples of faith might inspire us today, ones that might be right in front of us.

What about all those "saints," for example that built our church, both really and metaphorically?  Like the examples in Hebrews, many struggled as much as celebrated.  Some are no longer with us.   

The author of the Letter to the Hebrews writes that "since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us" (Hebrews 12:1).  How ironic that we think of having a "head in the clouds" as being someone who isn't really aware of their surroundings, someone who's off in a fantasy world of their own.  I'd challenge you to put your head in this cloud for a few minutes and think about who might be an example of faith for you, an example worth following.

Now, hang on a minute, it's not as easy as it sounds.  It requires some discernment.  First, discerning what is truly an example of faith and second, how it might apply in your own life.  After all, everyone's journey is uniquely their own.

So look both ways as you step out in this cloud: look back - and around you! - and see the examples of faith that are there; and look forward, on to your own journey.  

More than words

Do you know the Lord's Prayer?

I remember when I was little, the very first thing I learned about church was that everyone could say the Lord's Prayer from memory.  There was something pretty powerful about

that, a whole church full of people kneeling, bowing their heads and reciting the words together, "Our Father, who art in heaven …"

I'm sure every faith tradition has its unifying action, prayer or song or ritual, and for me The Lord's Prayer was exactly that.  The notion that people all around the world were reciting the same words, maybe in different languages, maybe different phrasing, maybe different intonation, some reserved and thoughtfully, some exuberantly, some spoken, some sung, but all the same words: there's a pretty powerful sense of unity there.

I guess.

There's a certain power in the action of recitation, I suppose, but prayer isn't just about recitation.  Reciting the prayer and knowing the prayer are two different things.

We were watching the movie "42" the other night, about legendary baseball player Jackie Robinson becoming the first black man to play professional baseball in the, then, all-white major leagues.  There's a scene at the opening of his first game in a Brooklyn Dodgers uniform.  As a man sings the American national anthem, the camera pans across the stadium, moving down the line of all-white-but-one players just in time for the words "the land of the free and the home of the brave."  "The land of the free."  Fine words to sing, but the meaning needed some work.  Still does, and we might remember that, too, that our national anthem asks God to "keep our land, glorious and free" - for everyone.

So do you know the Lord's Prayer?  It speaks with the intimacy of a parent-child relationship, inviting God's kingdom on earth.  It asks for nourishment.  It asks that we be forgiven, as we would forgive others.  I'll just say that one again: as we would forgive others.  It asks for protection from temptation and evil.

It asks God for some pretty big things.  Well, actually it seems to demand some pretty big things.  Someone I know likes to sneak a "please" in there every so often, just because it seems like we're being pretty demanding.  After all, it asks for a lot, but offers …what?

It's a beautiful prayer, but unless it's based on a relationship that is true, the demands are simply that, demands.  To call God father - or mother - requires a commitment to that relationship being true.  To "hallow" God's name requires a willingness to embrace the holiness of God.  To ask for our daily bread requires we be responsible for the life that nourishment feeds.  To ask for forgiveness as we forgive others requires we actually do that - forgive others - and a desire to be forgiven ourselves.  To ask for protection and deliverance requires hope in the future.

To know these words in prayer is to know God in your life and to know more than words.

New Life?

I didn't write a blog last week.  Or the week before.  I don't really have an excuse, but the journey did bring me here.  I might wander a bit now, and I might go where we'd all rather not, but stay with me, please.

Two weeks ago, I was going to write about the story in Luke's Gospel of the centurion who has such faith in Jesus' power that he asks him to heal his slave who is ill.  Jesus is amazed at the strength of his faith and honours his request.  

There's some really interesting things in this story about healing, faith and authority.  I thought I had a couple of pretty good ideas, but I also wasn't preaching that week.  Instead, I was attending a Celebration of Ministries service where two people were ordained, one commissioned to diaconal ministry and four clergy admitted from other denominations.  It was a nice service with some themes around "call."  I remembered my own ordination and the journey to it.  I also had an opportunity, on the way there and back, to think and talk about ministry and the church with another minister.  Our denomination of the church is going through a complex review process at the moment and churches everywhere are facing declining membership and participation, including fewer ministers.  And an even steeper decline in finances.  Many are even questioning the future of the church as an institution.

The thinking continued after the ride.

And then the next Sunday was Union Sunday, celebrating the 88th anniversary of the United Church of Canada (closest Sunday to the actual day, June 10).  And the Gospel story for Pentecost 3 is the next story in Luke: Jesus comes

to a town where he encounters a grieving mother following her dead son to his burial.  Jesus has compassion on her and brings him back to life.

Back in seminary, I had a professor who liked to explore how we interpret things by putting ourselves in the story and she'd ask "who are you in this story?"  So I want to tie all this wandering - and wondering - together with that question.  But first, think about this one: who would the church be in this story?

I think it's the dead man.

I want to say that the church is Jesus, showing compassion to the grieving and giving new life to the lost, because that's who we should be.  But is it?  Or is it a human structure who's time has come to an end in it's present form.

I chose those last words carefully.  

We talk about death and resurrection, we talk about ends and beginnings, we talk about times past and new life, yet, when we talk about the church we so often speak from the perspective of survival, maintenance, maybe sustaining or, at best, change. If we are truly a resurrection people, why is it so hard to have faith in seeing an end and a new beginning?  

What is true, like God, continues on though it's form may change.  And what is true becomes a part of us in other forms and ways and is no less valued for that.  The son's life, the mother's life, all those watching, their lives have been made different by this moment and will not ever be the same.

So who are you in this story?  Will you be in the crowd, watching and feeling sorry for the mother, but feeling helpless to do anything?  Or will you be the mother, mourning this loss, knowing that this part of your life is gone and wondering what will happen to you now?

Or will you be Jesus?  Yes, Jesus.  Showing compassion, living love and sharing grace - the life Jesus taught and showed us to live - is empowering and life-giving.  When Jesus lives through us, new life comes of it.

And there's the moment of synchronicity.  When we are Jesus to the world, we give new life to the church.  And, with new life, the church is life-giving to us.  It's not about systems or structures or processes.  It's about being Jesus to each other and the world.

We are the church.

Three in One in Three

Since it's Trinity Sunday this week, I thought I'd look up "The Trinity" on Wikipedia, just to see what it says.  The Trinity's one of those church ideas that tends to scare people a little, I think, because it's a tricky concept to get our heads around.  And we're always trying to explain things, aren't we?

That's why Wikipedia is so cool, by the way.  Anyone and everyone can contribute to it.  Of course that's also why Wikipedia is "mostly accurate" in the same way that Miracle Max said Westly was "mostly dead" in The Princess Bride.  (Spoiler: he wasn't completely dead.)

So Wikipedia says that "the Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons or hypostases [their fundamental or underlying state]: the Father, the Son (Jesus Christ), and the Holy Spirit; 'one God in three persons.'  The three persons are distinct, yet are one 'substance, essence or nature.'  A nature is what one is, while a person is who one is."

Right.  Well, there you go.  At least they go on to say that the Trinity "is considered to be a mystery of the Christian faith."  Yes it is.  And they go on to say a lot more.  A lot.  After all, we've been talking about this mystery for a long time.

The word "trinity" isn't in the bible.  It wasn't even used until the third century.  But it's the way we describe the relationship presented to us in Christian scripture, the relationship between God (the father), Jesus and the Holy Spirit.  People wondered.  We gave it a name.  We've wondered more ever since.

It's awfully hard to come up with something definitive that everyone can agree on.  And right there is the problem.  

First of all, with all due respect to Wikipedia, trying to "define" God is limiting, to say the least.  Second, our relationship with God is both personal and communal (i.e. there's even more relationships).  That's a lot of unique and personal understanding to contend with and a lot of different contexts to take into consideration.

So it's a good thing that we constantly revisit this wonder that is the Trinity.

I believe that there is one God and we all come to that God in different ways.  Not just through different faith traditions, but even within those faith traditions.  Some people find the power of the Spirit to be their cornerstone, for example.  Witness all of the people these days who describe themselves as "spiritual" but not belonging to any tradition or church.  Or the "pentecostal" tradition that emphasizes the power of the Spirit at work in the world.  Or followers of Jesus, from those who follow the example of Jesus' life to those who look more to the atoning power of Jesus death or stress the need to receive "Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Saviour."  Or those who look primarily to God as the creator, the power of the universe.

See, I think that we all connect with God in these many ways and we each, perhaps, have a relationship that is most meaningful to us, or at least more meaningful in some contexts.

But.  We should also remember that each of these doesn't stand alone.  In wondering at the immensity of the one God - can you really "define" God? - we can meet the life of Jesus, "the Word made flesh" (John 1:14), and the Holy Spirit that inspired and empowered the disciples at Pentecost (Acts 2).

We've sought other ways to describe the "three that are one," mostly to address the gender issue.  Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer is perhaps the best known of these.  But, hang on, doesn't it seem like we've lost a little bit of the important relational nature of the original?  Maybe Parent, Child and Love.  Or Augustine's 4th century attempt of "Lover, Beloved and Love between."  There are more.  You might even have your own.  After all, it's a mystery.

A Theology of Forward

Everyone has a birthday.   It goes without saying really, doesn't it: you have a day of birth, you have to have a birthday.

Perhaps you don't celebrate it.  Some don't because of religious or cultural reasons.  Some don't' think it's ever a big deal and for others it's a big deal or not depending on how old you are.

When you're very little, it's a big deal because "wow, people are making a fuss about me and there's presents."  Then you get a little older and it's more like "soon I'll be old enough for a driver's license and there's presents."  Then it's "soon I'll be able to vote and consume alcoholic beverages (though definitely only in moderation and never at the same time - voting and drinking, I mean) and there's presents."  Before you know it there's a job, marriage and children and then you're 30 or 40 or 50 and we might start to think birthdays are somehow not important anymore.  And, before you know it, we've had so many we'd like to stop counting.

But then there's sometimes a little change: we've had so many that every one begins to count more because it's another one.  But even that gets a little tiresome.  After all, it's been so many.

And there's the birthday conundrum: you have a day of birth, therefore you must have a birthday.  Our view of birthdays is based primarily on the view that it's an anniversary.  We count the years past.  We look back.  Even when we look at ourselves and ponder where we are on this year's birthday, our reference point is the rear view mirror.

When people have a birthday at our church, we sing a birthday song for them.  Not the standard "happy birthday," this one goes "Happy birthday to you, oh happy birthday to you!  May you feel Jesus near every day of the year.  Oh happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you!  Have the best year you've ever had."  The year ahead, that is, may this year be the best ever.  And may you feel the presence of Jesus each day of this year ahead.  Ahead.  Forward.

Pentecost is the church's birthday.  Not just our church, but the whole church, the day we celebrate the beginning of the christian church.  Pentecost was a Jewish harvest festival (it still is, called "shavuot"), and all of Jesus' original disciples were meeting to celebrate.  The story (Acts 2) tells how the Holy Spirit came to them as wind and fire and inspired them to begin preaching and teaching the story of Jesus.  The "church" was born!

Perhaps the best part of the story from the past to remember is that the Spirit inspired them to "begin," to take all that they had learned and experienced with Jesus and move forward with it, to make change happen and make this world a better place.  Looking back over the past 2,000 years that's not always happened.  The world hasn't always been made better by church.  Or by it's absence, either.

But here we are, looking back again.  Sure, a glance to see what we might learn can be helpful, but let's remember the Spirit inspires us to begin, not end; to go forward, not back; to step out, not retreat in; to live, not just survive.

Jesus promised that the Spirit would work among us, teaching us and inspiring us to live - and love - as he had taught (John 14:26).   It began with the disciples, it goes forward with us.

This Pentecost, celebrate the church's birthday with the excitement and enthusiasm of new life.  Let's live a theology of forward.